'No, I don't mind her doing a little work in an honest way like that. I'm not such a fool. When she has done the work send her off, that's all. Poor soul! she does look as if she had been dead and buried and come to life again. Mother, you're a good 'ooman, and God bless you!' Mrs Prothero looked up into her husband's face with an expression of such love and joy as must have delighted a much harder heart than that spouse possessed. Don't laugh, gentle reader, at the conjugal embrace of that middle-aged pair, which seals the quarrel about the Irish girl; but believe me, there is more real sentiment in it than in most of the love-scenes you may have read about. Mrs Prothero took advantage of her husband's approval of Gladys's exterior to send her out into the garden in the evening to breathe the air, and afterwards into the fields. The girl's strength gradually returned, but with it there appeared to be no return of youth or hope. A settled melancholy was in her countenance and demeanour; and when Netta rallied her on being so sad and silent, her reply was, 'Oh, miss, there is no more joy or happiness for me in this world! all I love have left it, and I am but a lonely wanderer and an outcast!' When the shirts were finished, it was time to think of her departure, for she had exhausted all the sewing-work of the house. Mrs Prothero could not bear to turn the friendless, homeless girl adrift on the world. She ventured upon the subject one day at dinner. 'What will become of her, David? And she so beautiful! I declare I think I never saw a prettier girl.' 'Well, mother, who will you call pretty next?' said Owen, who had seen her once or twice by chance. 'Why, she has no more colour in her face than this tablecloth, and I don't believe she has any eyes at all; at least, I never saw them; but I mean to try whether she has any some day, by making a frightful noise when she drops me that smart curtsey in passing.' 'I am sure we want hands badly enough in the wheat field, said Farmer Prothero. 'If the girl could pick up her crumbs a little by harvesting, you could keep her a while longer, and then send her off in search of her relations.' 'Thank you, David. I will ask her what she can do,' said Mrs Prothero. 'Not much in that way, I am pretty sure,' said Netta. 'How should those wretched Irish, who live on nothing but potatoes, know any thing about the wheat harvest?' 'Treue for you there, my girl,' said Mr Prothero, 'but I daresay mother will make believe that she knows something.